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opinion:
our view
Wall helps maintain
memory
The wall came down
Tuesday, one of the most enduring images of the Sept. 11 attack
on America.
It was the mangled
frame of the former Twin Towers, the largest remaining piece
in the rubble. In danger of falling, the wall was taken down
as a precautionary measure.
The wall will now
move into storage. There is preliminary talk of using it as
part of a memorial in years to come. But just where the memorial
will be built -- and how the wall will be used -- is in question.
Developer Larry
Silverstein, who holds a 99-year lease on the World Trade
Center property after signing a $3.2 billion contract in July,
said he intends to build four 50-story buildings or even resurrect
the twin towers on the site. Unfortunately, he has made no
clear mention of a memorial on site, or even using the wall
if one is built.
Silverstein must
make the right move. The wall must be taken back to its original
location -- the very area of destruction -- and used as the
centerpiece of an on-site memorial.
Not only that,
the two foundations that once housed the Twin Towers should
not be home to any more skyscrapers, but a memorial floor
and possibly a small museum.
Future visitors
to New York will identify with the largest remaining piece
of the World Trade Center -- the piece most visible from television
aerial and ground shots of the destruction they had seen countless
times -- and the vastness of the empty space.
Mourners, some
who have been to Ground Zero repeatedly and those who have
not, will have a place to reflect on their personal losses
and those of others.
With this, everyone
will be able to feel the true magnitude of Sept. 11, 2001
firsthand.
Other memorials
have been constructed on sites of devastation: Pearl Harbor,
Oklahoma City, Hiroshima, etc. Even MIT has already built
a 12-by-25-foot wooden replica of a fragment of the former
Twin Tower's wall.
New York Mayor
Rudolph Giuliani has repeatedly made good decisions during
these difficult times, and there is another he needs to add
to the list: Mayor, use the wall, it will insure no one ever
forgets.
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